Royal Renegade

by Alicia Rasley

  The squire decided he could have legitimately heard this, as he was helping her out of the wagon, and answered, "The old keep was a gray fortress, matter of fact. But the viscount's ancestor tore it down, what, a century ago? His wife didn't like it. Said it was drafty and old-fashioned." He ruminated for a moment, his hand still on her elbow. "My wife says the same thing about the Grange. But I'm not so bewitched as to give into her whim. Of course, my wife's hardly as bewitching as the late viscountess, either. She had red hair, miss, like you. Ain't that right, Devlyn? Her portrait hangs there right in the front hall. Red hair and—"

  "The viscountess—my great-grandmother—" Devlyn interposed, "had visited Italy and stayed at the Villa Capra, designed by Palladio. I take it she spent the next few years cozening her husband into demolishing the fifteenth century keep. And that is how I ended up with a Palladian villa instead, absurd as it looks here on the Dorset coast."

  "Well, I think it is beautiful," Tatiana said loyally. She ran up the wide marble stairs as Devlyn hung back to give the squire his instructions. This is Michael's home, she thought, flinging open the great oak door.

  The great hall was flooded with late afternoon light from the towering Palladian windows at each end. It was fortunate, Tatiana mused, that the light was so golden and welcoming for the hall, for all its rosewood wainscoting and blue silk French wallpaper and lofty balcony, was quite bare. Not even a chair marred the emptiness of the chamber, made even more echoing by the vaulted dome above. It was all so lovely, but so lonely, as if the house was waiting for someone to come and fill it with love.

  Her neck strained from trying to decipher the silver and gold fresco on the dome, Tatiana was drawn to the portraits that hung on one wall under the magnificent curve of the mahogany staircase. The Danes were a handsome family, she concluded, though none of the viscounts dressed in the ornate styles of the previous centuries had Michael's quiet elan. In fact, several of the men had lines of dissipation around their eyes and mouths—too much a part of their natures, apparently, for even sycophantic artists to conceal. Selfishness was painted into their uncaring postures and the cynical twist of their mouths. Michael's countenance, in contrast, was unmarked with those telltale signs of dissolution, something Tatiana found oddly comforting.

  As she waited for Michael to join her, she moved along the wall, looking for a picture of him. Finally, at the end, she found a family portrait in a modern brass frame—a dark-haired woman sitting in a sunlit garden with her two children. Where was the father, Tatiana wondered, even as she focused on the small boy standing at his mother's side. Something in that straight posture, in the proud way he held his shoulders, defined that little boy as her Michael. And his smile—the boy was smiling just as Michael always smiled at her when she finally teased him beyond the limits of his control—a sweet smile, generous and exasperated, his eyes lit with silver and laughter.

  The boy rested his hand on the shoulder of his little sister, a pinafored little beauty of two or so, with dark ringlets and a sunny grin. Merry was her name, and merry she was, and Tatiana thought sadly of a happy life cut short by tragic chance. Little Merry, safe on her mother's lap, could not have known that she would not live to fulfill the promise of her name.

  In the image of his mother, Tatiana thought she saw the genesis of Michael's wary composure. For the lady was quietly beautiful, her blue eyes serene and soft, her dark head tilted in a way that was both poised and watchful. She had none of the careless confidence of the men whose portraits had so intrigued Tatiana. No, Michael's mother had shared his sense of restraint, of watching and waiting and never trusting entirely to fate, as if she knew somehow how cruel it might be.

  The door creaked open, and Tatiana hastened back to the portrait of a lady with an ornate powdered hairstyle topped with a feathered headdress. Michael wouldn't want to find her studying that picture that symbolized his great tragedy. So when he entered the hall, she was able to look up and declare gaily, "I've found your great-grandmother, I think, the bewitching one who tore down the old keep. See, her hair is powdered, but you can see just a glint of red underneath. What was her name?"

  Michael came to stand beside her, so near that she could hear the rough linen of his sleeve brush against her wool dress. "Don't laugh now. It was Desiree."

  "Why would I laugh? I think it's a lovely name. So romantic—no wonder your great-grandfather demolished his ancestral home for her. She is lovely, isn't she? Desiree—oh, I do admire her."

  "John and I used to admire her decolletage." Michael absently ran a finger along the expanse of creamy bosom rising like snowy hills over the gold satin bodice. When he realized what he was doing, he turned abruptly away from the portrait. "I don't know where the servants have all got to. They become too accustomed to an absentee employer, I suppose."

  As if on cue, a cadaverously thin man of some fifty years appeared in the doorway under the staircase. He waited silently for his master to notice him, and remained silent even then, his hands clasped behind his back in a gesture both servile and dignified. He evinced not the slightest surprise to see his employer appear suddenly with a ragged girl in tow. "Ah, Travers, I was wondering if you'd absconded with the silver. I'll just be staying for the night. The lady here will need to freshen up for her journey to Weymouth. Send one of the maids here to help her."

  Travers bowed out, still eerily quiet, and Tatiana watched him go, biting her full lower lip. Devlyn noticed her expression and said gently, "You needn't worry that he will bruit this about. As you can see, he doesn't even speak to me. Efficient, but silent as the tomb."

  "It's not that—" The arrival of the young chambermaid cut off her demurral, but as she climbed the great staircase Tatiana completed the thought. It's just that you keep speaking of sending me away, turning me over to someone else. Package delivered. Mission completed.

  As she opened the door to a pleasant yellow bedroom, the dark-eyed maid eyed Tatiana with some curiosity. Since Tatiana was ordinarily inquisitive herself, she satisfied the girl with a story that had the added benefit of diverting her thoughts from Michael's dismissal. With her best languid French accent, she observed, "Such an exciting escape we had! Your master swooped out of the sky in his balloon and plucked me right out of the garden at Versailles! My father le duc will be so pleased to see me safe and sound and away from Bonaparte."

  Her loquacity, as usual, had the effect of bridging the gap between lady and servant. And while Louise, as she was named, helped Tatiana comb out her tangled red hair, they found that they had a favorite topic in common. The maid, as it turned out, was a great fan of Lord Devlyn, although today was only the third time she had ever set eyes on him. But she confessed that she had learned to read just to keep herself informed about her employer's exploits on the Peninsula. As she brushed out Tatiana's dusty frock, she recited full paragraphs of praise about Devlyn from Wellington's dispatches. "We are all so proud of him, a real Dorset hero, he is. And such a fine master, too, paying us so well, and it's not as if there's much to clean around here. Why, there are only four bedrooms in this wing furnished, and you saw the great hall, bare as can be. His lordship has been too busy destroying the enemies of the king to visit here often, but someday he will vanquish Napoleon and return to us."

  Tatiana listened with some fascination, for she seldom met anyone as voluble as herself, and Louise was remarkably well-informed about Lord Devlyn. In a few moments with Louise, the princess learned more about Michael's exploits on the Peninsula than he had told her in six weeks. And like the little maid, she felt her heart stir with pride.

  "Well, I don't know, miss. It don't look like it'll survive a washing." They both looked dubiously at the blue wool gown. It had never been anything more than serviceable, and now, after hours on horseback, a balloon ride, and a fall into a hayfield, it was plain lamentable.

  "Oh, I don't mean to put on that rag, Louise. And all my other dresses are back on—in Versailles. Is there anything here I could change into? Anything
of yours I could borrow? We are near the same size."

  "I have only my spare uniform, ma'am, and it's hardly fitting—"

  "Neither is this. Run and get it, won't you? And I'll send it back when I get my baggage. With a velvet cloak for your trouble. Do you like velvet? Blue, perhaps? I have several of them, so you needn't worry that I'll go cold."

  That promise had Louise speeding off to the servants' quarters and returning in moments with her spare uniform, a simple gray frock with a crisp white collar and a stiff starched apron.

  "It fits just fine," Louise said proudly, doing up the buttons.

  "And I look very prim, don't I? No one will recognize me at all." Tatiana had a wild thought of keeping this disguise, of taking a position as a housemaid somewhere—here at Devlyn, perhaps, with its heroic and generous master. But before she could ask Louise whether there were any maid positions open, a knock at the door made them both fall silent.

  Michael had changed into a fashionable blue coat and buff pantaloons, his Hessians gleaming impressively. Tatiana knew a moment of sadness. Gone was the handsome peasant who had teased her and kissed her as they floated across the channel. Once again the elegant, unreachable lord, Devlyn halted in the doorway, looking from one girl to the other, at their identical uniforms, and, Tatiana realized ruefully, their identical expressions of anxious adoration. Finally he nodded at Louise and thanked her, and with one last worshipful glance the maid left them alone.

  Tataina ducked her head a little shyly under his suddenly warm gaze. As if putting on this prim little outfit had stripped away all her princessly privilege, she found herself intimidated by his power. Of course, she told herself as he moved closer to her, now that he had put back on his lordly manner with his lordly clothes, Michael would never take advantage of his position—no matter how much she wanted him to. But then he smiled at her, wryly, resignedly, and took her hand in his.

  "You know, I've never been one to dally with housemaids—"

  His hand moved up her arm and came to rest on her shoulder. With an attempt at a laugh, Tatiana replied, "Louise will be so disappointed."

  "My resistance to abusing my authority is tenuous of a sudden. But Louise has nothing to do with it." Now both hands were on her shoulders, sliding down her back, drawing her against him. She closed her eyes to his silver gaze and rested her cheek against the fine linen covering his hard chest, sliding her hands under his coat to touch his sinewy back. She could hear the steady beat of his heart, feel the comforting rhythm of his breathing. But that rhythm accelerated and then halted, and his arms tightened about her until she was as breathless as he. With a curious hand, he caressed the back of her neck, the roughness of his fingertips sending tantalizing pulses through her. Then he tilted her face up and, when she finally opened her eyes, kissed her. Gently at first, his mouth teased hers, his tongue lightly tracing the boundaries of her lips. All the while he studied her, his enigmatic eyes searching hers for some answer. But the teasing kiss turned intense, and she never could seem to breathe again, and how could she give him an answer when she didn't even know the question? She had to close her eyes, for it was all so overwhelming: his hands, so rough and gentle; the barely sheathed power of his kiss; his searching, demanding gaze; her langorous, treacherous response.

  And then his mouth left hers bereft, and he whispered warm against her ear, "Think of something happy, Tatiana." Puzzled but obedient, she thought of their evening in France, of the warmth of the fire and Michael's easy confidences, and her mouth curved unconsciously into a smile. She felt him sigh, his chest pressing against her, then he kissed the dimple in her cheek almost reverently. "I've been wanting to do that—oh, all my life, I think."

  But as he touched her cheek where the dimple had been, his calloused hand reminded her that he was a soldier as well as a lord, and she was a princess, not a maid, and that their nations were making tentative steps toward peace ... It was all quite an impossible coil, and she couldn't bear it any longer. "I wish—"

  As her voice trailed off yearningly, he dropped a light kiss on the side of her mouth. "I know," he said, letting her go, and she sensed that he did know, and she wished he would tell her, for she didn't know herself.

  He tucked away a red curl which had worked its way loose from the neat chignon Louise had fashioned, and straightened her no longer so stiff apron. "You need only to brandish a feather duster, and no one will ever guess you were born a princess." His firm mouth quirked into an almost-smile, an unfamiliarly cynical sort of look at odds with his roughly gentle touch. "I shall never forget, however, that you are the granddaughter of a king, and a great-grandniece of Empress Maria Theresa, and a descendant of Peter the Great, and a connection of the Tudors, not just those upstart Stuarts and Hanovers."

  "Don't," she whispered, turning blindly away from him, her fists clenching at her side, anguish building in her chest at his taunting.

  Then she felt his hand slide down her arm and heard his longing words, "Don't forget me, Tatiana."

  Chapter Twelve

  London

  Three days later Tatiana found herself installed in a luxurious suite in the London home of the Countess of Sherbourne. After the long journey from Southampton, this was her first moment truly alone, and she savored it. She would have little enough solitude in the future, if Lady Sherbourne had her way. But that's what you wanted, she reminded herself, parties and society and lots of charming people. You had enough of solitude in the Winter Palace.

  The princess sat cross-legged, almost sinking into a soft feather bedspread with a coverlet of shell-pink satin. Her capacious bedchamber was opulent in a frankly feminine way, as if Lady Sherbourne's decorator had decided to fulfill the secret desires of every romantic novel-reading fourteen-year-old girl. And as Tatiana had not so long ago been exactly such a girl, she admired the trailing pink gossamer of canopy over her head, the delicate white filigree bedstead, the rose-patterned carpet plush enough to sleep on, the rose velvet draperies trimmed with gold braid, the creamy marble hearth with its dancing flames, the white and gold armoire, and the fragile vanity table covered with lovely crystal bottles and jars. The entire effect was exactly like the picture of the princess's chamber in Buntin's favorite romance, The Royalist's Revenge: a lush display of wealth and whimsy and womanhood.

  And after the cobbler's cottage in France, and Michael's elegantly lonely villa, her chamber seemed ostentatiously and utterly false.

  At least it was gratifying to be treated royally for a change. Tatiana had been given the most ornate suite of rooms overlooking the walled garden, offered the most delicate sweetmeats and tenderest wines, bathed and powdered and cosseted like a prize Pekingese. Cluttering the gilt foyer tables downstairs was further evidence of her royal welcome: the silver engraved cards of invitation from the queen and the Prince Regent, and towering bunches of flowers from a few cabinet members and the French monarchy in exile, so far the only ones alerted to her arrival in town.

  And Tatiana had been treated from the first with the utmost ingratiation, the likes of which she had never known. The countess, though she spoke with an annoyingly managing tone, said "Your Royal Highness" so often and so warmly that Tatiana thought her in love with the words. The few servants allowed into the royal presence backed out of the room bowing as if Tatiana were the pope instead of a mere princess of minor note. Tatiana chuckled, thinking that back in Russia she would still be scrubbing the grimy faces of the children of servants like these. Her laughter was arrested by a wave of longing for those simple children with their innocent acceptance of her real, not royal, self. But it was too late to turn back now: she was indisputably a royal personage with royal prerogatives and all the attendant royal persiflage.

  It had all been so disorienting, this last few days. After that tantalizing moment with Michael, she had been whisked away by General Sir Robert and Lady Akers. She'd give a pony to live through that meeting again. Distracted as she was by Michael's suddenly distant manner, she hadn't fully en
joyed the astonishment of the Akers when they were introduced to a chambermaid, complete with white apron and the imposing title of "The Princess Tatiana of Saraya Kalin." Kind but uncomprehending, they took her in their carriage to their home after Michael left to track down poor Captain Dryden. The next morning, Buntin arrived, stunned by sequential losses of her charge to the sea and the air, but could do nothing but hold Tatiana's hand and weep all the way to Southampton.

  There the royal escort Major Lord Devlyn successfully completed his commission, delivering his package directly to the Foreign Office representative in Southampton one week ahead of schedule. Tatiana had not spoken to Michael during that day's journey, for he had ridden alongside the carriage on his restive black stallion as she sat with Buntin and the courteous Lady Akers. And in Southampton, there was no time or privacy for a farewell. She could only hug to herself the memory of looking back at him as she was handed into yet another luxurious but uncrested carriage for the ride to the government house apartments. His gaze was curiously intent, and his lips moved silently just for a moment. Was he wishing her a final farewell as she embarked on her new life?

  Angrily she punched the rotund pillow in its satin cover. Surely no one actually slept on such slippery material; last night her head kept slipping right off the pillow! She would have to ask for a good honest percale pillowslip— Would she ever see Michael again? He had spoken about going back to the war, to his position on Wellington's staff. But during their balloon ride, hadn't he said he would be in London if she needed him? Of course, he had just kissed her, or had been just about to kiss her, and she wasn't able to pay very much mind to his words. But he had whispered that she had to promise him to turn to him first when she was in need, and she had promised, and then he had kissed her— Surely that meant he planned to be in London, for she could hardly send to the Peninsula for his aid, could she? She should be insulted, that he was so sure that she would make a mull of her debut in society and require his rescue once again. But she wasn't insulted, she was only missing him and his quiet aloneness and his sweet, reluctant smile.